


The Epicness of Friendship

by orphan_account



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Friendship, Gen, bit of angst, fluff and friendship, mentions of BOFA
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-22
Updated: 2013-05-22
Packaged: 2017-12-12 16:29:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/813624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a celebration of sorts of the amazing friendshi of Dwalin and Ori<br/>because they give me fluffy feelings</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. meetings

**Author's Note:**

> Some time ago there was a week of Orwal on tumblr, and while I don't ship these two, I love their relationship all the same. So I took part. And never posted it here.  
> But I'm tidying my files a bit, so here we go.

To be quite honest, Ori hadn't been too impressed with Dwalin, the first time he saw him, at Mr Baggins'. Yet another bulky warrior with more brawns than brains, he had thought. You got those a lot around Ered Luin, because they were the most likely to have survived the dragons, the wandering, and the battle of Azanulbizar. It was sad for the race of dwarves, but most of the clever ones hadn't survived all those hardships.

But when later that night, Ori had seen the warrior take a viol from his bags, when he had heard him play it better than anyone he had ever met before, he had been forces to reconsider his first impression. Maybe, just maybe, some warriors were more than brute strength.

 

* * *

 

Dwalin had immediately been impressed by that little thing of a dwarf. Younger than the princes, almost as small as their hobbit host, raised by two dwarves he knew to be either fussy and overprotective, or impossible to trust and chronically absent, and yet there he was, looking ready to attack the dragon on his own if need be. Oh, yes, he _liked_ Ori.


	2. Protection

Ori wasn't a warrior, that much he knew. Him, and everyone who had met him. If people ever wanted to see a dwarf who wasn't a warrior, all they'd have to ask for was a picture of him.

Which was why he needed protection, he knew. So when he had been offered to join Thorin's company (and a true, proper offer it had been, because he was a proper scholar and he could take notes on their journey and tell the tale once the deed was done) Ori hadn't been surprised at all that both his brother had requested to come too (well, maybe Nori had surprised him a bit, but to be honest Ori suspected he had a few problems to run away from) because he wasn't a warrior and he wouldn't last a day in the Wild.

People tended to want to protect him, anyway. He was fairly small far a dwarf (he realized just how small he was when their hobbit turned out to be almost as tall as he was) and not very strong, and he had never really learned to use any weapons, because Dori said that fighting might damage his hands and they couldn't risk that.

Which was exactly what he tried to explain to master Dwalin, when the older dwarf claimed that he couldn't go again after wargs with only a slingshot, and decided to teach him how to use his war-hammer.

Dwalin had just laughed. “You might hurt your hands in a fight, lad, but that's a better choice than dying because you can't defend yourself.”

“I'm a scholar, master Dwalin. Without my hands, I can't earn a living, I can't do anything. If I don't have hands in a working state, I might as well be dead anyway.”

“Don't say that around Bifur and his cousins, lad,” Dwalin warned him. “They know what it's like to wonder if death isn't a better fate, and they'll tell you that the answer is no. There's always something to do when you've lost everything. But for that you've got to be alive, and to be alive you have to fight. Now try to lift that hammer, if you can.”

And as it turned out, Ori could. It surprised him more than he'd dare to admit, but Dwalin just nodded and smiled.

“You're not bad. You're already holding it the right way. I'll make a warrior of you, lad. A poet warrior, and you'll be fearsome with both words and weapons, if the Maker allows it.”

“And maybe some day I'll be so strong that I'll be the one protecting you!” Ori said, and immediately regretted to have dared to make such a joke. Certainly, Dwalin would be angry that he presumed to...

“Laddie, if one day in battle you save my life, I'll be proud to have helped you on your way,” Dwalin solemnly answered. “But for that, you'll need to do more than lift that thing. Now come here, I'll show you a few moves...”


	3. Family

Dwalin was almost family, Ori thought. He came to see them once a week (usually to ask for or give news of Nori) and, while at first Dori had welcomed him with as little politeness as he could, now it wasn't unusual for the guard to stay and have dinner with them. It wasn't exactly a traditional, not as such, but they all knew that on Friday evenings, Dwalin would come, bringing desserts, asking if they had seen Nori (they always said no) or telling them where he had last been seen (they already knew, but they appreciated the effort).

Sometimes, Dwalin couldn't come, because something had happened and he was needed elsewhere, so he'd send another guard, or Balin, to deliver the dessert in his place and give his apologies. Other times, Nori was home and they couldn't have Dwalin bump into him, so Ori would run to the Watch's headquarters with a share of food in a basket, and Dwalin would pretend he didn't know that their brother was there.

It was nice. It couldn't last, it just couldn't. Dori kept saying that one day, Dwalin would tire of it, or that he'd come and find Nori there, and he wouldn't be able to pretend he didn't know anymore, so he would have to arrest their brother and that nice little friendship between them would be over.

Dori had been right of course.

One Friday night, Dwalin arrived, and Nori was there. The thief had been hurt, badly. How it had happened, they never knew, though Ori later suspected that _Dwalin_ did. But at that moment, all that mattered was that Nori was hurt, bleeding all over the floor because of wounds that he'd had for a few days and that just would heal, as he managed to tell them through gritted teeth. And his brothers had been so worried that he might have been poisoned that they had entirely forgotten what day it was, until there was a loud knock on the door, and Dwalin came without waiting for an answer, as they as so often encouraged him to do.

“I hope you won't mind, I brought some apple pie,” the guard started, pretending as he always did that his having dinner there was entirely unexpected. Apple pie was Ori's favourite. “I don't want to disturb you, but I'm sure you'll... what's going on here?” Dwalin asked, finally noticing what was going on.

They must have made quite the picture, Ori thought. Nori sprawled over their only armchair, bleeding on everything they owned, Dori desperately trying to clean the wounds, and Ori himself bringing his brothers hot water and as much clean cloth as he would find, but dropping it all as soon as he saw Dwalin.

This was about the worst thing that could ever happen, and the young dwarf watched with horror as their friend's eyes went hard and cold, as if he were assessing the situation. This was bad, Ori thought. This was very, very bad. This was the end of everything good that he had ever known.

“Please don't arrest him!” he begged, half wanting to run to Dwalin, but paralysed by sheer terror. “Please don't do that, not tonight, he's hurt, there was poison on the blades, it's not fair if you arrest him tonight!”

“Stay out of this, Ori!” Nori ordered him, trying to stand up and failing. He had to settle for a hard glare toward the guard. “My brothers have nothing to do with any of this, Dwalin, and you know it. It's between you and me.”

“Your brothers have everything to do with it,” Dwalin countered. “I know what I have to do, thief, and I will do what is right. Do not try to run away. Bleeding as you are, I'd find you again in the blink of an eye.”

And with that he had left, but not before carefully putting his apple pie on the ground, next to the door. Ori found himself staring at that abandoned pie, the symbol of everything that had gone wrong in just a few minutes. There would be no more evenings with Dwalin, laughing and joking and exchanging stories about Nori's deeds in others cities, or about Erebor as it was long ago before the Dragon, no more admiring Dwalin's tattoos and asking what they meant, no more showing the older dwarf his newest drawings. Months, years of friendship and good-humoured fun, gone in the blink of an eye. A knife to the guts must hurt like that, Ori thought.

Speaking of knives, the young dwarf vaguely heard his brothers arguing behind him, Nori requesting to be left behind while the other two tried to run away, Dori protesting that even with all his faults, Nori was his brother and he wouldn't abandon him, and neither would Ori. After a while, Nori stopped trying to convince them, though more due to weakness than because he agreed. And if there was anything more worrying that Nori not arguing with Dori, then Ori did not know what it was.

That was when Dwalin came back. Accompanied not by fellow guards, but by two very old dwarves, one with the whitest beard Ori had ever seen, and the other a healer, the sort whose skill were so expensive that a lifetime of Ori and Dori's combined salaries wouldn't cover a visit from him.

“Oin is a family friend,” Dwalin explained, looking rather uncertain. “He can have a look at your brother, if you allow it, and my brother Balin knows a fair bit about poisons, and he has agreed to help if he can. Do you accept that help?”

The three brothers looked at him, equally surprised, Nori and Dori already prepared to protest, probably to say they didn't need to beg for help from anyone, idiots that they were. Ori loved his brother, but sometimes they just didn't know what was good for them.

“We'd be more than honoured to have your help,” he claimed quickly. “Do you need anything at all? I can prepare hot water...”

“Then do that, laddie,” Oin ordered. “And you, lady, let that man breathe. I'll need some space to inspect his wound. Go cook something or help the boy!”

Dori grumbled something about not being a woman, but did as he was told.

Later, when Nori's wound had been disinfected and properly cleaned, and Oin give them a salve to apply to help to healing, and everyone had eaten save Nori would was sleeping, Ori asked Dwalin why he had done it.

“Done what, laddie?”

“Saved my brother. You could have arrested him. I thought you were going to. Why didn't you?”

“If I had wanted to do that, don't you think I already had plenty of occasions in the past? Honestly, all I'd have to do was arrest the two of you, and he'd come running for you. It'd be that easy. But that would be fighting dirty, using someone's _family_ against them.”

“And it's Friday night anyway,” Ori said with a smile. “You're almost family on Friday nights, aren't you?”

Dwalin smiled back, and ruffled Ori's hair. The young dwarf laughed softly.

He did love spending a nice night with his family.


	4. Cold

Ori liked Dwalin, he really did. What wasn't there to like? He was the dwarf everyone would want to be, taller and larger than necessary maybe, but strong and proud and just. Ori would have given anything to be like him, and since that wasn't going to happen in a thousand years, he'd have settled with just maybe being on friendly terms with him.

Except someone like Dwalin didn't have friends. Everyone in town knew it. Dwalin didn't have friend, didn't get close to people, and pushed away all those who tried. Lost too many people in the past, they said. A survivor of the Dragon, a veteran of Azanulbizar. Seen too much of the world. Cared for no one but his brother and the King, and even then it was probably more habit than affection. Oh, yes, everyone in town had something to say about Dwalin.

And maybe they were right. Dwalin was always distant, it was true. But he'd sort of look fondly at Ori sometimes, when the young dwarf came to see Balin to deliver a book he had ordered, and he always made sure to offer him some biscuits or fruits or sweets.

“Ye're too skinny and too small,” he'd always grumble. “Ye look like a hobbit more than a dwarf.”

If Balin was there, he'd scold his brother, explain that Ori was still young and growing, that dwarves that age were always shaped like that, and Dwalin would roll his eyes while Ori smiled. He knew this comments were not meant to insult and offend, but simply due to worry.

Not that he'd be so bold as to suppose that Dwalin liked him, Mahal no! That would only be wishful thinking, and his brothers had always told him that it was bad to indulge in that. Stick to the reality, they'd tell him. Life is difficult enough as it is without starting to dream about 'what if' and 'maybe'.

So Ori didn't hope. Too much.

But he still smiled at Dwalin whenever he met him, because so few people smiled at the warrior that he had probably forgotten what it was supposed to look like. You couldn't be expected to be nice to people if they weren't nice to you, as Dori often said. So Ori was nice to Dwalin, nice and as friendly as he dared, which was less than he would have liked.

And maybe one day, if he was really lucky, he hoped he'd finally see Dwalin smile back at him.


	5. Lessons

Ori liked it, studying with Master Balin. He got to learn so many things, how to write and draw and copy books and all sorts of other fascinating things. He'd be a copyist some day, and earn enough money to buy nice clothes for Dori and to make sure Nori never had to steal ever again (not that he was supposed to know about that, of course). It would be great, and he was very attentive to every single lesson.

But his favourite thing about it all, the best thing, was the secret lessons he got from Dwalin.

He wasn't supposed to. Dori didn't want him to use weapons, terrified that he would turn into another Nori. And Nori didn't like it either, because he often said that if you knew how to fight, you were always tempted to get into fights.

But it was just so much fun, lifting that huge hammer like it was nothing (“ye got yer brother strength then. Good for you, laddie, good for you.”) and using it to smash straw figures (“aim fer the head if ye can reach it, but that's no guaranty, ye're pretty small. Chest is a good place too, but if ye're in real trouble, then strike 'em in the stones, and they won't be bothering ye twice, trust me.”)

Oh, no, his brothers wouldn't approve at all. But he didn't care one bit.


	6. metal

All dwarves loved metal.

Metal wasn’t a difficult thing to love, of course. It was everywhere. You couldn’t live without it. It was in weapons, yes, and in jewellery too, of course. It was in cooking pots, in belt’s buckles and in buttons.

It was in hearts and bones, in eyes and hands. Metal was everywhere, especially when you were a dwarf.

It was obvious in some, like Dwalin, who was hard and unyielding, like antimony, and he would break rather than bend. That was what people expected of metal, and of dwarves.

It was more difficult to see in others, like Ori, who was soft and easy to adapt (too much so, perhaps, giving the impression that he was weak and useless, if you looked at him too quickly). That was because the small scholar had a heart of tin.

Men, hobbits and elves would have thought it strange, that Ori and Dwalin got along so well, when they were so different. Dwarves didn’t. They knew about metal. They knew how metal worked, and how to make it work better. They knew about alloys.

Antimony wasn’t very good on its own, it was too hard and would break. Tin wasn’t much better when it was alone, because it was too soft to be of any use.

But if you mixed the two, you’d get pewter, hard but malleable, an alloy that you could use for everything from tableware to toys or jewellery.  
 If you mixed the two, you created something better than the sum of its two components, something that would not rust or tarnish.

Antimony and tin weren’t much good, but pewter lasted forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (this one is one of my fav things that I've ever written) (don't care if others like it or not I'm proud of it)


	7. battle

The battle had been something dreadful, worse than Ori would ever had imagined. Books didn't tell you about the screams of pain, the smell of death and blood, the sounds of flesh tearing and bones breaking. He had supposed, from the way Dwalin refused to talk about Azanulbizar, that battle weren't quite as grand and glorious as old tales made them appear.

And Ori had lost everyone, ending up the only dwarf amongst a bunch of elves, and now most of them had fallen. Ori himself had been lucky. He only had a few scratches, and so he had volunteered to go back on the field and see if he could find survivors. There were still a few members of the Company that were missing. Their burglar, for one (and oh, he was still one of them, no matter what Thorin said!), and Gloin, and Dwalin.

It was Dwalin that worried Ori the most. Last he had seen him, the warrior had been surrounded by wargs as large as he was, and he had been bleeding in several places. If he was alive, he was probably in a terrible state. And he was alive. He had to be alive. He had promised.

He couldn't have died.

He had promised.

And Dwalin never broke a promise.

In the end, Ori found the older dwarf. Alive. Barely breathing. But alive.

The little scribe could have cried, he was so relieved. Instead, he called for help, and brought Dwalin to the healers. He stayed there with him, and no one protested. Dori only grumbled a bit, and brought him something to eat.

When Dwalin finally woke up, Ori was the first thing he saw.

“So you made it, laddie,” he croaked, his throat dry. “Are you hurt?”

“No. I was lucky. Here, you should drink this. It's... it's for the pain. Oin said you had some broken ribs, and two of yours fingers couldn't be saved. But you'll be fine. You'll be fine. I'll take care of you.”

Dwalin drank slowly, the water fresh but bitter with the taste of medicine.

“I thought you wouldn't wake up,” Ori admitted softly.

“I thought the same, laddie. I think I saw the great halls where our ancestors feast... Thorin and his boys were there, and they smiled at me... they called me... but it wasn't time for me. Not yet.”

“I'm glad it wasn't,” Ori whispered. “I don't know what I would have done if I had lost you too.”

Dwalin tried to smile, but found it hurt too much. Instead he put his unharmed hand on Ori's.

“I'm here, laddie. I'm here, and I'm staying here. But I'm... sleepy...”

“Then sleep. I'll be waiting for you. I'm not letting you out of my sight again. Never again.”

“Perfect.”


End file.
